RANGELESS RIDERS

To our Fellow Cowboy Action Shooters:

 

           Our 2015 season at the Highland Pistol and Rifle Club proved to be a test of patience and perseverance in the moral of the Rangeless Riders.  This circumstance was brought on by personality and personnel conflicts directed toward us from members of our former parent organization who had an agenda of their own.

 

            With the Highland Pistol and Rifle Club (HPRC) electing a new Executive Board and guided by the opinions of individuals on that board whose personal agendas lacked vision for the good of the order as an entire club, a deliberate plan was made to discontinue Cowboy Action Shooting (CAS)as a venue within their facilities.

 

            Our December shoot was cancelled in 2015 due to the proximity of deer hunters on a neighboring property.  It was during this weekend that I received a telephone call from the President of the HPRC informing me that the new Executive Board had voted us off the property and ended our 13-year tenure with our parent organization.  We were given 60 days to remove our equipment off of the range the we built.

 

           They could take our range from us, but they were not going to take our dignity.  We packed up our things and we left. 

 

           The hostilities from the HPRC in 2015 towards the cowboys wore thin on the moral of the Rangeless Riders, and during the course of last year, I believe that each of us asked ourselves privately why are we working so hard to make money for a parent organization who treats us as outsiders.  Due to the bond between ourselves not a single one of us Rangeless Riders ever once voiced that thought out loud.  I like to think that we had too much respect for what we had built than to allow such negative thoughts to undermine our moral.  It was our personal bonds, our friendships, and our love of providing a quality CAS event to our local SASS community that allowed us to exercise patience and perseverance in dealing with the HPRC.

 

          I must admit that upon receiving the news that our venue was closed, I could only focus on removing our equipment from the range and did not even want to think about the possibility of finding a new home.  I almost allowed these circumstances to put an end to my participation in running a CAS venue.  I believe that all of us were of a similar mindset to give up, except one.  From the first notice of receiving the news, Jean Duke Picard was determined to find a new home.  Within two days of his receiving the news, Jean Duke convinced me to join him in looking for a new facility.

 

            In January, I received a telephone call from Mascoutah Mark and another from Bob 'n Weev, informing me of possible venues who may be looking to add CAS to their shooting activities.  Both telephone conversations brought one club to my attention; Brittany Gun Club in Shipman, IL.

 

            I talked it over with Jean Duke, and as a result, Jean Duke set up a tour of the facility last month.  What we discovered was a promising location with shooting bays on the range, parking across from the range and a climate controlled clubhouse twice the size of the one in Highland.  More importantly, we met with the owners of this privately owned facility and found a welcoming atmosphere with a management attitude who strives to treat every shooting venue at their facility with equal respect. 

 

           On Friday, March 19, the Rangeless Riders held a meeting.  We have unanimously voted to attempt to make Brittany our new home.  The following morning several of us met at the club to tour the facility and meet the owners.  We showed up unannounced.  Regardless, we were made to feel welcome.  We talked with the owners for a long time, and every one of us who showed up that day, joined the club as a result of that meeting.

 

           I am pleased to announce that the Rangeless Riders will hold a Cowboy Action Shoot at the Brittany Gun Club on Saturday, May 7.  We plan on retaining our first Saturday of the month slot on the calendar.

 

             This event will be our probationary shoot.  I believe that if we just act as we always have, demonstrating the "Cowboy Way" we will show these folks exactly who we are, and we will be welcomed to continue.

 

             I have always believed in divine guidance.  I believe that this new home is our reward for exercising perseverance and maintaining a professional demeanor in dealing with the HPRC.

 

            I want to thank all of you in the CAS community in advance for your continued support.  I would like to extend a special thanks to Mascoutah Mark and Bob 'n Weev for your help in placing us in contact with Brittany.  I also want to thank the members of the Litchfield Cowboys who braved the cold and gave up a Saturday morning to render assistance to a fellow club who needed help moving.

 

           I do not want of forget my fellow Rangeless Riders who braved the rain and the sloppy mud to help us move, attended the meetings and helped us take the decisions who got us where we are right now. However, I certainly do want not to eclipse the years of dedicated service month after month that all of you have given.  I don't care that our badges still say "Highland, IL”; wear them with pride, you've all earned them.

 

 

 

After fourteen seasons in as many years, the Rangeless Riders have been forced to close our doors to the Cowboy Action Shooting Community.

 On December 5, a telephone call from the President of the Highland Pistol and Rifle Club was made the President of the Rangeless Riders in order to convey the message that by the vote of the Executive Board of the HPRC the Cowboy Action venue is no longer desired to be offered as part of their activities.

 We will all continue to see all of you at other venues.  We encourage all of our former shooters to support and continue to participate at all of the other local venues in SASS community.

 The term Rangeless Riders was coined by a group of cowboys who had no range to call their own.  We kept the name after we found one.  We are now once again “rangeless”.  We have since added several new faces to that group.

 While we have suffered a devastating blow, we Rangeless Riders will continue to support our fellow clubs and venues, wear our badges with pride, and continue to be a part of the local Cowboy Action Shooting community.

 Please keep us in your thoughts and prayers as we do our best in following divine guidance in order to determine if we are destine to find a new home.

 Sincerely, the currently active Rangeless Riders

 

 

 

 

 

"Rangeless Riders”- A phrase coined by three brothers-in-law, who were seeing a lot of windshield time traveling between Cowboy Action Shooting events in the local area. Those cowboys were Silver Creek Pete, Hassayampa John Mossman, and Will E. Hittum.

 

As most of you know, our inaugural shoot was held on February 2, 2002, but I want to take you back a few months before then to tell you about the journey leading up to that date…

 

In the course of the travels of the three brothers-in-law, they made a few friends along the way including, myself and I. M. Heeled. Heeled and I met these Rangeless Riders at the Arnold Pistol and Rifle Club during their first season, when they were open to the public, and also shot together with them at Effingham, and the old Nason Mine.

 

In July of 2001, Silver Creek Pete arranged for a reporter to accompany us to the Effingham shoot to write an article on the sport of Cowboy Action Shooting for the Highland News Leader. It was a very complimentary article and a copy of it is posted as one of our artifacts.

 

At that time and it may still be true today, the Highland News Leader was owned by the Belleville News Democrat. Impressed with the Highland article, the News Democrat wanted to do a similar article for its readers. Heeled was working, but the rest of us met the Belleville reporter, one August afternoon at the Collinsville Mc Donald’s not far from the old Caseyville Rifle and Pistol Club. Dressed in full cowboy gear, we took her into the Caseyville club, and set up a mock cowboy stage with makeshift targets of boxes and bowling pins. Using a stopwatch instead of a timer, we gave her a real Cowboy Action demonstration.

 

Our efforts were rewarded with a full front page article in the Lifestyle section of the Saturday Bellville paper. Again, if I may direct your attention to our artifacts...

 

Meanwhile back at the ranch… and I refer to this ranch, the Highland Pistol and Rifle Club, these articles captured the attention of the then Club President, Jim Jackson. At that time, the club was in financial trouble and Mr. Jackson was looking for a venue to help raise revenue to keep the club on its feet.

 

If I may point out, the land on which is this club is built, was, before its time, the farm of the Haislar family. I believe all of you know several members of that family. We know them as Silver Creek Pete, Katie Talon, Betty Don’t Hittum, and Miss B Hittnum. All siblings if ya’ll weren’t aware.

 

In late August of 2001, Mr. Jackson approached Silver Creek Pete and proposed a Cowboy Action venue at this facility. One problem though, nobody within the club had a clue as to how to run such a match. “That’s okay”, said Pete, “I’ve got plenty of friends who do know how.”

 

In mid-September, 2001, shortly after the terrorist attacks, The Nason Mining Company Regulators held a two day cowboy action shoot in conjunction with a Civil War reenactment. Mr. Jackson was invited to attend. There, Pete introduced Mr. Jackson to John, Willie, myself, I. M. Heeled, Katie Talon, Wolf Creek Jake, and Betty Don’t Hittum, (Betty had not yet started shooting at that time.) Mr. Jackson liked what he saw, and left with good news to bring back to the Highland Pistol and Rifle Club Officers and its membership.

 

I think it is more than a coincidence, or even fate, that at that very event, we met a Cowboy who was the last missing piece of team we needed to make this concept a reality. We met a retired boilermaker who had the skills to properly cut and weld steel and had all the equipment we needed to make the targets that we required to make our first shoot possible. Moreover, not only did this man have the skills we needed, his demeanor, generosity, and enthusiasm made him our very close friend; I. Rob Banks.

 

In early December of that year, John, Pete, Willie and I had a formal sit-down with Mr. Jackson right over there by the fireplace. We took inventory of our assets, and this idea was sealed into reality with a hand-shake. We even voted on what to call ourselves and despite Willie’s desire to change our name, the rest of us decided to allow the name of the Rangeless Riders to stay, and our club was born. A date was set for our first event, and February 2, 2002 was chosen.

 

What the hell were we thinking??? We had given ourselves less than two months to make props and targets, beg for databases to mail flyers, make road signs, and write scenarios for our first event.

 

Banks, Pete John and Willie arranged a deal through Mr. Jackson to allow us to scour the Grappershaus Steel scrap yard, not far from here, to find steel suitable to make targets and heavy rebar and pipe for stands. After many hours of scrounging, cutting, and loading, they had the materials we needed for our first set of targets.

In mid-January, the Rangeless Riders met at Banks’ garage for our first target building workday. If I recall correctly, Pete had already been helping Banks earlier that month on the larger targets, and by the time we arrived the shotgun swingers, and speedy targets were already done. We set to work cutting plate and bending and welding rebar stands. By the time the day was over, we had 14 targets and stands, two shotgun swingers, and two speedy targets. Enough for a shoot, with some creative stage design…

 

Meanwhile, Heeled and his friend Rick O’Shay, were working on a portable barn wood wall with a window and a door; our first prop, which is now a permanent part of our cantina.

I don’t know how we did it, but on February 2, 2002 we were ready. We set up the night before and for a new stage writer, I was up late that evening editing and rewriting my first attempt at the stages for our inaugural event.

 

That next morning the skies were overcast, but the weather was cooperative for a first Saturday in February. I still don’t know if it was faith in our reputations or morbid curiosity to watch a train wreck, but 71 shooters and a reporter from the Belleville paper turned out for our first event.

 

We were nervous, but as the day wore on, we could see that everyone was having a good time. Our first shoot was a success! Many a cold beverage was raised numerous times that afternoon, after our targets were put away. I remember coming home that night late, exhausted, and proud of what we had accomplished.

 

I don’t mean to exclude anyone, or disregard the contributions that others have made to our organization. Likewise, please forgive me if I do not recall the correct dates when certain members have joined our organization or accomplished major projects, but over the years, the faces and names of our ranks have swelled and shrunk, and change is the only constant that we’ve experienced in our growth, but I digress…

 

By June of 2002, we had had a few work days, built more targets and stands, and lots more props, to the point where we were crowding the rest of the membership out of their own garage here in the clubhouse. It was decided that we needed storage of our own, so Pete arranged for an old reefer trailer to be purchase and delivered to the club. Upon delivery, the semi-trailer had the dollies and the axels cut off and the box was set on rail road ties and our new storage unit began to fill up. I even once remember that Willie tried to put a moratorium on new props, just before he built one of our biggest props, our hell-steed…the moratorium didn’t work.

 

One thing I have to admire about Jim Jackson, he is a man of vision. Even back in our December, 2001 meeting, he had planned to give us a range of our own with a full cowboy town. His vision is now a reality, the only part that he got wrong was the timeline. In 2004, dirt work on the Cowboy range was started, but due to an internal miscommunication with the club, the berm was not in a useable configuration. That same year, Willie Hittum and Hassayampa John took on a project outside of the Rangeless Riders to build a portable jail for use at the first ever Illinois State Shoot. Informally, it became known as “Dale’s Jail”.

 

By 2005, the ranks of the Rangeless Riders had swelled with the addition of several names like, Joe Shelby, Miss Kissy, Boben Weev, Miss Weev, Montana Ranger, Montana Di, Colonel Darlin, Mimi Darlin, Tincup Tinhorn, Wild Bart Jones, Roger the Dog, Tenshot Tammy, and Blackfoot Bob. That year too, the reins of the Rangeless Riders leadership were passed from Silver Creek Pete to me, and my new right-hand man was Cascade (I never saw a target I wouldn’t use) Charlie.

 

In 2006, the dirt work on the lower berm was fixed, and under the leadership of Rangeless Rider President, Colonel Darlin, several of our professionally retired members, Boben Weev, Roger the Dog, Blackfoot Bob, Tincup Tinhorn, and Montana Ranger, began construction of our first structure, the permanent installation of Dale’s Jail and a pavilion with a picnic table.

Our first event on the new range was marked by the biggest event in our club history, to date, the fund raiser for Frisco Kim, 99 shooters attended that event. 2006 also saw the addition of Kentucky Lawman and Kentucky Kountress to the ranks of our growing organization.

 

The growth of the lower range over the past five years has been a blur for me. Maybe it is because I have taken a lesser role in the club’s business, and maybe it is because a lot of the work that is done on the range is performed on days or times when I cannot attend, but the teamwork and the dedication to our organization has not faded, it has simply been assumed by new faces. New faces like Izzie Lost and Shirley Eis Lost.

 

So thank you for bearing with me as I have recited this brief history of our organization. I guess I have been too busy working all of these years to stop and see the big picture that Jim Jackson had for us all the way back in December of 2001. It seems to me that his vision has come to a reality. Anyway, I look at the faces that wear our badge today, and I am very proud to still call myself a Rangeless Rider.

 

Inspector